Basic Capturing Techniques in Go: Ladder, Net, and Snapback

The capturing move in a Go capture problem usually takes the shape of one of a few standard techniques. Knowing the big three — ladder, net, and snapback — lets you spot the move that captures at a glance.

Ladder (shicho)

You keep the opponent's stones in atari and chase them across the board to the edge, where they run out of escape. It's atari, the opponent extends, you atari again from the other side, zigzagging until there is no liberty left. The catch is the "ladder breaker": if one of the opponent's own stones already sits in the ladder's path, the chase fails and the stones escape. Before you play, read the whole chase to the end — can you keep giving atari at every step?

Net (geta)

Instead of atari, you place a stone so that wherever the opponent runs, they are still caught — a single move that throws a net with no escape. The net is the technique to reach for when a ladder doesn't work (when there's a ladder breaker).

Snapback (uttegaeshi)

You deliberately let the opponent capture one of your stones, then play right back into the point they just vacated to capture a larger group. The opponent, seemingly escaping atari, actually walks into being captured.

Telling them apart in a capture problem

• First count the liberties of the target stones.
• If you can keep it in atari and chase to the edge, it's a ladder (check there's no ladder breaker on the escape path).
• If you can't chase but can seal every escape in one move, it's a net.
• If letting one stone be taken lets you recapture more, it's a snapback.
• In every case, read the opponent's best reply to the end before you play.

How to practice

On TsumeDojo the go problems ask you to capture the marked white stones and are verified by exhaustive search. Solving many of them with these techniques in mind builds the instinct to see the capturing move at a glance. (Eye-shape life-and-death — eyes, seki, ko — is on our roadmap.)